Please help

oh and btw, i am not making the game myself.

To find out more about my game go to http://terraforce.iwarp.com

Peace
Anthony

If you are trying to sell your game idea to a development company in the hope that they develop it and pay you a royalty, I have bad news for you: It''s not going to happen.

Most companies won''t even look once at unsolicited design documents, because of the potential copyright problems. Instead, they get filed away in the shredding machine.

Also, developing a game is an expensive, high risk business for the publishers. Many games don''t even make enough money to cover their development costs, let alone make a profit. As a result, very few publishers are going to risk their money on a game idea from a teenager with no track record, when there is no shortage of people with considerable industry experience with lots of good ideas already out there.

There are two options open to you if you want your game to ever reach fruition:

1. Get a job in the industry as a programmer/artist/tester or whatever best suits your skills, and try and get into a design role from there. After a few years experience as a designer, you might be able to get a publisher interested in your game idea.

2. Develop it yourself. If it is far too ambitious for you to do on your own, then you''ll need to find people who will help you. Bear in mind that unless you are very wealthy, you''ll probably be wanting these people to work for free, at least to begin with, so you need to be able to convince them that your project is worth them giving up their free time for. You can post a request in the Help Wanted forum, but I''d strongly recommend you read the Help Wanted FAQ and some of the existing posts before you start your own, so you can get an idea of what you need to include in your post to get good results.

well, then i hav more bad news for me, seeing as i have no experience in game developing, don''t want it as a job and assumably, most ppl won''t work for free. I''m telling you that I will make this work, even if I have to go down to UK headquarters to speak to these ppl.

To find out more about my game go to http://terraforce.iwarp.com

Peace
Anthony

Sadly the anonymous poster is right. No-one''s interested in paying you for just your ideas, except possibly when you have a track record of making ideas that pay. Even that''s no guarantee, as I know of many successful developers who couldn''t get venture capital for their projects. (Which is incidentally also why I reject the idea that the best way to make innovative games is to put forward a proposal, budget, etc etc... it just won''t work.)

[ MSVC Fixes | STL Docs | SDL | Game AI | Sockets | C++ Faq Lite | Boost
Asking Questions | Organising code files | My stuff | Tiny XML | STLPort]

so ur point is give up now? Wow, u ppl give up easy. will never give up. That is a fact. If I have to learn every bit of programming in the world just to get these ppl to speak to me, so be it.

To find out more about my game go to http://terraforce.iwarp.com

Peace
Anthony

They''re not telling you to give up.

They''re telling you to do exactly what you say..."learn every bit of programming in the world"

Moo.

will that help though (is it just cred?)

To find out more about my game go to http://terraforce.iwarp.com

Peace
Anthony

quote:

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Original post by Rexford
will that help though (is it just cred?)

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Well, knowing everything about programming won't help: but knowing enough to write the game, or at least get a working prototype, will.

If you can show publishers a working version of the game, they'll be able to make a better judgement about how feasible/marketable/fun the game is, and therefore whether it is worth investing in. Not only that, but the more complete the game when you show them the demo, the less risk they have to take to publish it. All this translates as a much improved chance of being taken seriously.

At the end of the day, an idea without an implementation is worth nothing.



[edited by - Sandman on April 23, 2003 10:22:52 AM]

heheh, u think I could make this game?? Knowing all the programming in the world I couldn''t make a prototype becos of the technology required. I have designed this game to hav lots of detail so a smoothed-over version would quite possibly ruin it. I also want massive interactibility in-game. Is it possible to do this?

To find out more about my game go to http://terraforce.iwarp.com

Peace
Anthony

quote:

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Original post by Rexford
heheh, u think I could make this game?? Knowing all the programming in the world I couldn''t make a prototype becos of the technology required. I have designed this game to hav lots of detail so a smoothed-over version would quite possibly ruin it. I also want massive interactibility in-game. Is it possible to do this?

---

If you think you would be unable to develop the game even if you knew everything there was to know about programming and modelling etc, then what makes you think that any other developer would?

Sounds like your game design might be a little bit too ambitious....

i don''t think that''s the problem. I myself am not a multi-million dollar corporation witht the technology for movement mapping, tests of physics engines etc and this game needs something with a little capital to make it happen. It''s not too ambitious, it just needs financial backing that a 16yr old doesn''t have.

To find out more about my game go to http://terraforce.iwarp.com

Peace
Anthony

But why would, as you say, a "multi-million dollar corporation witht the technology for movement mapping, tests of physics engines etc" want to spend millions on a game designed by a complete nobody (from their point of view)? A 16 year old with no programming experience, no game design experience, and who dont even want to learn the neccesary skills to do this? Very few games actually manage to make money, so big publishers aren''t going to spend millions on ideas they''re not sure about

As someone said earlier in the thrad, ideas are 10 a penny... Even good ideas from proven, experienced designers are 10 a penny... Well, maybe only 7 a penny, but you get the idea...

They are right. Video game companies aren''t like how they were 5 years ago. These are business that come and go like the night and day.(except for the exceptions)

I, about 4 years ago, when i was a senior in highschool, I was able to arrange for my programming class to have a fieldtrip to Southpeak Interactive. These people, despite what I would have thought, let a group of 15 ambitous kids come to where they make games. The place was impressive, them being funded by SAS(Goodnight owns SAS, and also Midway ailines, SouthPeak is SAS daughter company), I knew they''d have money coming out their ears.

Stone floors, a whole movie lot studio. These wonderful people talked to us about what it takes to make videogames, kinda went around in stations, and they gave us a T-Shirt on the way out.(All programmers love free T-Shirts!)

These people were wonderful.

I also got the lead engineer from RedStorm Entertainment at that time to come to our class. He gave us some background on things, really kickstarted a few of us. Way cool.

Mind you this was 4 years ago. And 4 years ago, IMHO was a whole different world.

I sent an email about 6 months ago to these companies and about 6 others when i was trying to decide if I should uproot, and go to Fullsail.(Fullsail still has impressive facilities, but oh you''ll pay for it) I wanted to know if a 4 year CS degree is more respected to their company as apposed a 2 year from this place.

Every company sent me a letter back to the likes of "We don''t appreciate unsolicited email, blah blah blah". This was just a question. I''m trying to map out a future now that I''m ready to. I only recieved 1 actual response. "It would ultimately depend on the ability of the person trying to apply" This response was way better than nothing, yet still didn''t give me much direction in this decision.

I was just trying to just ask a question. Thats all. And that was even too much for their PR, they all im sure just sent me a Formed Letter.

And you my friend, want to try and sell an idea to these companies. I did that also when i was your age... well actually 17-18. I emailed companies wanting to tell them my ideas. They don''t want to hear. They have plenty of their own ideas, and to tell you... companies from what I''ve seen with my own eyes. Have a rough plan for what they want to do almost 2-3 years in advance, sometimes even more.

When they are working on one project, they are finishing up the ideas for the next. Which will take another 2 years developing in itself(average)

The best thing you can do, is develope your own idea. Take the reigns into your own hands. I still know i''m far off from having the skills to bring my ideas to life. But thats ok, i still have the rest of my life.

Keep your ideas down on paper. And work towards making them happen. Get a job in ther industry, and then try to work your ideas in. But for now, your in no position to do anything, except write them down.

Those are your choices. Don''t quit on your dreams, but don''t for one minute think a company will buy your idea. Not now, not at this point.

Goodluck.

-DD

Do you have some talent besides coming up with designs? You must be able to write, draw, compose music, or program well, or else you will not be able to convince people to join your team. I can do all of the above except draw, and I''ve had about four people join my team. Two of them asked to be let on my team, and they work harder than me some days.

"Ph''nglui mglw''nafh Cthulhu R''lyeh wgah''nagl fhtagn!" - mad cultist, in passing

I just read a little bit of the info on your site. Sounds a bit like the upcoming Brute Force in that it''s a team of 4 involved in infiltration/espionage.

Is there a reason you feel you need millions of dollars to do this? Have you thought about making it a mod of an existing game? Any of the current FPS engines would probably be quite capable of handling it.

First off, Im a 16-year-old newbie myself, so if one of you old foxes of game design see a major flaw in the following, please share, and I will learn.

If you do think that this game is so great and can compete with all the others (*looks at others* well, who knows, this might be a frigging great idea he''s sitting on) there are ways to realise it, but sending the idea to a well-established company with years of plans ahead is not one of them.

For fun, me and a friend are creating a game... (Ah well, stop that frowning, keep reading! ). Nothing big at all, just a small shooter for me to evolve in my modeling and designing and for him to evolve in his programming. We are planning on this to be some nice addition to our portfolios.

If we - later on in the production - decide that we want this to be bigger (and there is place for expanding) our plan is to get an audience.

My suggestion is this;
Go and put that great ground-breaking idea aside and design a small, nice little game. Perhaps afterwards you can design another and so on. Learn how to model and program or perhaps team up with some other gold diggers out there. Put up a website and put some screenshots on there (Cause we all love them screenies, don''t we? ) and make yourself a name.

If you''re lucky (yes its a bit of luck in this) you will have a small audience already waiting when it''s time to release the game. The men behind Counter-strike ("Oh my god, is he using that old example again!?") had already been creating several counter-terrorism mods before the actual CS. And look now at the fans awaiting Condition Zero...


So there are ways, but they are few and narrow, and won''t let everybody through unless you really fight for it. Don''t give up, but don''t go in there thinking you can change the world with this one, final the-world-might-aswell-blow-up-now-cause-no-one-can-better-this-game idea.

Richard Olsson
maxed@johnbauer.org

quote:

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Original post by Machaira
...it''s a team of 4 involved in infiltration/espionage.

Any of the current FPS engines would probably be quite capable of handling it.

---

Well, to comment on the first bit, it''s not actually all four going in and I haven''t really heard much detail about Brute Force but the basis is, if u r playing one-player, it''s you and one computer player, with you being able to choose from three ppl to be u and one of the remaining two to be ur companion (one person is left at ase, as a guide etc). With the two-player co-op, u have 3 of u, 2 players a cmoputer player.

This is not a FPS game, it is a 3d action game. Actually it might be action-adventure, think Tomb Raider, Tenchu and that genre (not being too specific like "sneak ''em up action" etc). However, if you''re saying that I could use other ppl''s engines (I''ve resigned myself to making this myself) then I''m all for knowing how but remember that I know jack all about programming right now.

To find out more about my game go to http://terraforce.iwarp.com

Peace
Anthony

You''re putting the cart before the horse. You need to learn some basic programming skills before you write the next Halo. You should get a decent book on C++ and try doing a text based prototype of your game.

hi yeah, thanks all for the input but NOT AN FPS. Thank you

To find out more about my game go to http://terraforce.iwarp.com

Peace
Anthony